1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a technique for adapting an image forming apparatus provided on a network to an environment commonly used by users having various authorities.
2. Description of the Related Art
Conventionally, a device access to an image forming apparatus such as a printer has been performed by various utility programs executed on a client. Therefore, the client capable of executing the utility program can easily execute the function of the utility with respect to the image forming apparatus by executing the utility program.
More specifically, for example, all the clients for which a queue manager of print job is set executable execute the queue manager program so that the status display or control of the print queue of the image forming apparatus can be performed.
However, since various users may be present on the network, when the control for the image forming apparatus is performed from all the clients for which the utility program is installed, the normal operation of the image forming apparatus may be remarkably threatened. For example, when a user who does not have any knowledge on the network executes the device manager program from the client for which the device manager is installed so as the change the network configuration, the image forming apparatus cannot operate normally so that the normal operation may be stopped.
Further, in recent years, a mobile environment has been enhanced, in some cases the network in a company is temporarily provided to a user outside the company and a print for the image forming apparatus is performed. At this time, if the queue manager is installed in the mobile client of the user, the user outside the company can print or delete the print job remaining in the print queue of the image forming apparatus. This is remarkably dangerous from the viewpoint of confidentiality of business information.